To help Teachers decide what to use for a Web Page Presence
TeacherWeb
Pro's
If we only use one thing we only have to train on one thing. (good point. lets go with one less expensive/better thing that TW then)
District / ITS control.
Teachers and Parents are familiar with it
NewsFlash Option is relied on heavily
Nice templates to pick from since the upgrade
Con's
Limited (on what it can do, space, teacher creativity, etc)
Short on features
Cumbersome to work in (password for everything, multiple steps for one task, etc)
Reliability issues over the last couple of years. I cannot recall a teacherweb training I presented where there was not some sort of issue.
We don't get to pick the url naming convention whereas hosting in house we could (ex: JohnDoeMHS.roundrockisd.org, JaneSmithCVMS.roundrockisd.org)
We rely on them when there are issues rather than being able to solve in house (small enough company that this has been an issue)
Very expensive! - That money would be better spent on hardware/support.
Other thoughts on TeacherWeb:
TeacherWeb is worth the money for teachers who use most of the features (we don't need to pay $30/year for an auxillary staff to have a bio)
- free alternatives just as capable.
Have teams setup one TeacherWeb site per team (some pages shared, others specific to each teacher)
- doable (and makes more sense) at the elem/ms levels but not as realistic at HS level.
- MS kids are cross teamed so team sites do not work well
General Thoughts:
- After talking with teachers here is what I've found to be important to them.
News Flash Feature (can be fixed via email and RSS feed)
To help Teachers decide what to use for a Web Page Presence
TeacherWeb
Pro's
If we only use one thing we only have to train on one thing. (good point. lets go with one less expensive/better thing that TW then)
District / ITS control.
Teachers and Parents are familiar with it
NewsFlash Option is relied on heavily
Nice templates to pick from since the upgrade
Con's
Limited (on what it can do, space, teacher creativity, etc)
Short on features
Cumbersome to work in (password for everything, multiple steps for one task, etc)
Reliability issues over the last couple of years. I cannot recall a teacherweb training I presented where there was not some sort of issue.
We don't get to pick the url naming convention whereas hosting in house we could (ex: JohnDoeMHS.roundrockisd.org, JaneSmithCVMS.roundrockisd.org)
We rely on them when there are issues rather than being able to solve in house (small enough company that this has been an issue)
Very expensive! - That money would be better spent on hardware/support.
Other thoughts on TeacherWeb:
TeacherWeb is worth the money for teachers who use most of the features (we don't need to pay $30/year for an auxillary staff to have a bio)
- free alternatives just as capable.
Have teams setup one TeacherWeb site per team (some pages shared, others specific to each teacher)
- doable (and makes more sense) at the elem/ms levels but not as realistic at HS level.
- MS kids are cross teamed so team sites do not work well
General Thoughts:
- After talking with teachers here is what I've found to be important to them.
Other :
Google Sites. - Have an Education Template - https://sites.google.com/site/classtemplate_en/
Weebly
yola
eBoard
SchoolFusion
Schoolwires
Blogger
District hosted WordpressMU
District hosted Joomla sites
Pro's
Con's